"There is a long-standing debate within the environmental movement about its historical origins. Some point to the 1962 publication of Rachel Carson's seminal book Silent Spring and accounts of the first Earth Day in 1970. Depending on the author, either of these two events is hailed as the beginning of the modern environmental movement. With her groundbreaking book, Rachel Carson alerted postwar America about the unintended consequences of the chemical industry on the natural world-and inevitably humans-leading to the banning of DDT in the US."